Friday, May 26, 2006

More and More Cameras

The Chicago Police Department plans to expand their latest high-tech crime fighting tool -- cameras that can scan thousands of licenses plates an hour. [...] Officers who field tested the scanners during the past two months have made 14 arrests and recovered more than 100 stolen cars. The department plans to add 13 more of these license plate scanning vehicles to patrol around the city.

100 cars but only 14 arrests? We guess they didn't get the driver too often then. The biggest beef we've heard with this vehicle is that they have had to have a separate car assigned to them to do the recovery paper and arrests. We don't know if that's going to change with more of them on the streets, but it would seem a bit inefficient at the moment. Is that going to change?

All this technology bullshit is just a public relations ploy. We the police know these "toys" really don't make a damn bit of a difference as far as crime goes. However, the citizens think its the best thing since sliced bread.

Tonight I was at a beat community meeting and the residents were praising the shit out of the license plate vans and BDU uniforms. I wanted to vomit, but held my chow.

There was an old adage in the army:"You can either have your boys or your toys".

It appears as though king richie has made his decision based on the rapid loss of manpower on the street.

He has traffic aides, meter maids, TMA's writing tickets (usually to vehicles who don't respond to their every wish, not those who actually violate any law), not to mention other DOR employees, cameras to catch people who violate red lights or late turns on red, and now trucks to read plates in a vain attempt to do what? Cut down on speeders? Find stolen vehicles?

Given the opportunity, we will all be reduced to report takers since we know that arresting people makes them 'feel bad about themselves' and crushes their self esteem.

Plus think of all the money the city could save if they closed down ALL the lock-ups. Soon they would only need to generate GOCR's so that the citizens could feel served.

This is a bad sign. It is not a tool for us, they are looking at it as a replacement.

If I'm correct then whats the probale cause for scanning the plates? Go to court when you get some guys in a hot car and when the defense attn asks why did you pull my client over? And you tell them, no reason, I just scanned their plate and it came back stolen. The judge is gonna respond......no probale cause.....next. Im curious how the city will respond or how we'll get the blame for violating peoples rights. Just food for thought. Be safe everyone and keep your heads up! God Bless

Hey community college lawyer (above) you don’t need probable cause to run license plates. You can run them at random. Been in court never lost a case, there is nothing wrong with running them at random. The academy tells you that you need pc but you don’t. The academy doesn’t know what they are talking about plus there training is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO outdated.

The United States Supreme Court has upheld that Police Officers do have a right to randomly run license plates that are on the public way. This is for two reasons: one is that the plate on your vehicle is not owned by the driver, but the state that plate was issued in, and two the vehicle is being operated on the public way, therefore your have no expectation of privacy when your vehicle is on the public way

I understand that.. just tell that to the judges you constantly throw out cases when your only probale cause was well........random check...I have never personally got or heard of anyone getting probale cause with that as your reason. Hell, the asa wont even speak with you if you said that to him! I was just trying to prove how messed up Cook county really is. Law book say one thing, but judges and asa's do another. It's sad....really really sad.

While the above case is Wisconsin law, the principle is the same here in Illinois and under the U.S. Constitution. An individual driver has no expectation of privacy with respect to his license plates attached to his motor vehicle while that vehicle is in plain view or upon the public highway. Any plate can be randomly checked for compliance, i.e., validity, at any time for any reason or for no reason. That said - if you stop the vehicle, i.e., the driver, you must then meet the Terry standard of "reasonable suspicion" (not, probable cause), that a crime is or has occurred or may be occurring. If after making the stop based upon reasonable suspicion, the officer determines that his suspicions were correct, he then has "probable cause" for the arrest.

Its a progression, observation, reasonable suspicion, probable cause. Probable cause is not needed at each and every step of the preliminary investigation.

I'm am so tired of FTO's and supervisors and academy instructors giving their "opinions" of the law rather that telling new officers what the law really is. It makes us all look really stupid.

As for the P.O. who tells the PD that he pulled over the guy for "no reason" he just blew his case (stupid) and his follow up statement that the car was hot is now merely alibing a bad stop. You tell the PD that you pulled the car over after a computer check of its license determined that the vehicle was stolen. That's your reasonable suspicion and the basis for the stop.

If you don't know how to talk to a public defender or a states attorney when presenting your case, its time you learned. If you keep losing perfectly good cases then it is you who is doing something wrong not the other guy. Been to court on hundreds of cases and won most. Its persperation, preparation and presentation. The 3 P's of winning in court.

TO 4:43 AND 6:25 THANK YOU.AS AN FTO I SPEND A GREAT DEAL OF TIME EXPLAINING TO MY RECRUITS HOW TO WORK FROM REASONABLE SUSPICION TO PC. I TAKE PRIDE IN THE FACT THAT A LOT OF MY OFFENDERS PLEAD BASED ON MY PAPER AND TESTIMONY,EVEN THO IT CUTS DOWN ON MY COURT TIME. THANKS FOR THE EXCELLANT COMMENTS

After about two months these machine will be like all the rest, LEADS is down, the system is DOWN or the information will pop up ten minutes after the car has passed. Now thats why they're assigning ISP because they have a better computer system.

Just goes to show you that most of the coppers here are either LAZY or STUPID in regard to running license plates, as the one poster said you have to sell your story to the ASA when you call. I've heard so many guys fumble thru the phone call, no wonder it's rejected! And don't even get me started on court, these coppers can't testify for shit!!! Go to Traffic Court and testify just for the practice of how to answer questions, no one gives a fuck if you lose there!

10 recovered cars and 14 arrests....most of the recovered steals are parked, a few are previously recovered by their owners but never cleared from the system. The plate readers sometimes take district cars with them (the van and the Tahoe can't chase) (although....we can't chase for just a stolen car anyway....)

the van is worthless. when it scans the plates and hits on one, the guy in the van has to run the plates on the pdt to find out why the scanning camera hit on it. when the van's sitting stationary the plate it hit on is a few blocks away by the time anything happens.

Hey 0714:You joined the NRA AFTER your guns got stolen and you're pissed because they didn't bend over backwards to find them for you? Did you try adding them to your insurance afterwards too and filing a claim? If you were a member BEFORE they were taken, you would be covered by their insurance. You're a softball and nothing more.

The license plate readers are meant to be a tool, like the spotlight or take down lights. It will never replace an officer. The legal dept said it is pc based on it popping hot because the computer cannot profile. It runs every plate, not random ones (up to 3,000 an hour).

Having worked the van, they told us to get district cars to recover any hot vehicles because they wanted thew van driving around getting more reads, not down on paper, although, half the time, we did the paper, especially if the owner was driving.

Technology is not the solution, it is a tool. I'm certainly not going to go back to 1850's firearm technology or 1950's vehicle technology (personally, I like A/C and air bags). And who wants to go back to call boxes?